


Theory isn't reality

by FamousRory



Category: Infinite (Band)
Genre: M/M, short appearance of Myungsoo and Sungyeol too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-17
Updated: 2015-09-17
Packaged: 2018-04-21 05:54:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4817579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FamousRory/pseuds/FamousRory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Woohyun tries to understand his relationship with Sunggyu through every way possible before realizing that maybe, the only one that can explain it is himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Theory isn't reality

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the book "Kitchen" by Banana Yoshimoto and by all the videos I watched about quantum entanglement and other scientific subjects :) 
> 
> Hope you enjoy the story !

It's the middle of the afternoon, and Sunggyu is softly snoring, a thick literature book still open between his hands, chin resting on his chest. Woohyun watches him, then looks back to the laptop in front of him before setting his eyes on Sunggyu again. He can't help but wonder, does it work with people too?

He knows it's overall stupid. But he got the idea stuck in his head since the first few seconds of the video, and the longer the man was talking, the more Woohyun was thinking about it.

Quantum entanglement.

Just said like that, it doesn't mean a lot. Woohyun never even heard about this before he found the video on YouTube. But it made sense suddenly, and Woohyun felt as if he has found the thing that was missing in his life before. And quantum entanglement explains a lot, actually.

 _‘If entangled, one constituent cannot be fully described without considering the other(s)’_ , Woohyun reads on Wikipedia after he finishes watching the video for the tenth time. Quantum entanglement is about particles, or groups of particles which are strangely entangled and can only be considered as a whole, but all Woohyun sees here is he and Sunggyu.

Woohyun sometimes wonders if there was a time in his life without Sunggyu. There was, of course, because the first time they met Woohyun was already 7, but he doesn’t have much memories from the time before. Every time he remembers something from his childhood, there’s Sunggyu with him.

There are good and there are bad souvenirs. There are moments with Sunggyu, moments without him, but somehow the older boy is always related to everything. When Woohyun spent one month of his summer vacations at his grandparents’ house when he was 14, it was because Sunggyu and he had quarreled and stopped talking to each other, and he didn’t want to see Sunggyu, who lived two houses away, every time he was in his garden. Sunggyu was not with him, but in a way he was; Woohyun always thought about him when he talked about this summer.

 

Sunggyu moves in his sleep, distracting Woohyun from his scientific discovery, but doesn’t wake up. Woohyun’s eyes linger for a while on Sunggyu’s back. Somehow, he hopes the quantum entanglement theory can help him understand his relationship with Sunggyu, and above all, understand why he sometimes reacts in ways he doesn’t get.

 

#####

 

“I think we are entangled.”

“What?” Myungsoo raises his head from his computer and stares at Woohyun with a confused face. They’re in Myungsoo’s room, working on a project they have to do together for one of their class, but Woohyun can’t focus on anything as he keeps thinking about himself, Sunggyu, and quantum entanglement.

“Me and Sunggyu.” Woohyun explains. “I think we’re entangled.”

“Can you speak a language I understand, please? What are you even talking about?”

Better than explaining by himself, Woohyun opts for showing the video to Myungsoo, hoping the younger boy would also understand the similarities between the theory and Woohyun’s life. However, Myungsoo seems even more confused after the video.

“Hyung, if I decided to study art and drop everything that had to do with science, it’s for a good reason. I didn’t get a word of what the guy said. And how is that even related to Sunggyu?”

Woohyun sighs loudly. “We are entangled. Like the particles.”

“You mean you can also communicate with each other even if you are thousands of kilometers away? Like, through your thoughts or something?”

“No, I mean…” Woohyun clicks his tongue with exasperation. Myungsoo is one of his closest friends after Sunggyu, and he expected him to get the point of what Woohyun is trying to explain. But it’s not the case. “I mean, we’re always linked, you see? Even when he’s not here, it’s like he’s with me, ‘cause I keep thinking about him, or the thing I’m doing is related to him or something…”

Myungsoo squints his eyes and seems to focus all of his attention on Woohyun. It encourages him to continue.

“And it’s like, last time we went out. Before the club, at Dongwoo’s place, I was very happy and in the mood to party, but Sunggyu was tired and stressed. But then in the club, he was happy, dancing with that ugly girl, and I was suddenly really angry and sad.”

“The girl was not ugly.”

“That’s not the point. The point is, like the entangled particles, we spin in opposite ways.” Myungsoo makes a face to show he doesn’t get the point. “When I was happy, Sunggyu wasn’t, and when Sunggyu was happy, I wasn’t.”

For a while, Woohyun keeps staring at Myungsoo expecting his friend to show some kind of reaction. But Myungsoo just stares back without saying anything, then slowly nods.

“Yeah. I don’t think ‘entangled particles’ are the good words.”

“What do you mean? It explains it perfectly! Like when we were in the club and I-”

“Hyung you were just jealous.” Myungsoo cuts him. Woohyun scoffs loudly.

“Jealous? Why would I be jealous of Sunggyu dancing with an ugly girl?”

“She was not ugly.”

“That’s not the point!” Woohyun almost shouted the last words, but Myungsoo doesn’t seem affected by his sudden anger.

“You’re wrong, that’s pretty much the point here. You were jealous, that’s all. Your quantum entanglement explanation is bullshit, and you know it, stop lying to yourself. It’s like that time when you were trying to explain everything with astrology.”

Myungsoo is about to add something more, but Woohyun is already standing up, grabbing his laptop and books. He storms out of the room before Myungsoo can stop him.

 

#####

 

It’s almost three weeks later that Woohyun understands why Myungsoo was saying that quantum entanglement wasn’t the good explanation. He’s currently watching Sunggyu on stage, playing guitar and singing for the first time in front of a crowd, and Woohyun feels like he’s going to cry.

Sunggyu looks so happy, so proud and moved, that Woohyun’s heart is about to burst from the same feelings. Sunggyu has always dreamed about becoming a singer, and Woohyun can’t help but think back to all those summer nights when they were pretending that there was a crowd cheering for them while they were singing in Woohyun’s room.

Of course, quantum entanglement is not the explanation, because they don’t spin in opposite ways. As long as Sunggyu is happy, Woohyun is happy too. The Sunggyu he’s looking at on stage, the one with the smile so big it makes his eyes disappear and the cheeks red from excitement, that’s the Sunggyu that Woohyun wants to look at every day for the rest of his life. And as the crowd cheers loudly for his best friend, Woohyun’s heart beats faster than ever.

 

#####

 

Sungyeol is always the one who comes with the most stupid ideas in their group of friends. This time, he has downloaded a stupid app on his stupid phone that test compatibility between people based on their names. It’s the stupidest thing Woohyun ever saw, and the results are complete bullshit. 

“Hyung,” Myungsoo calls him, then shoves the phone on his face. “We are 100% compatible, we should get married or something!”

Sungyeol is laughing loudly behind him, and it just annoys Woohyun even more. He pushes Myungsoo’s hand away, maybe a bit too harshly, but he just can’t help it.

“This app is fucking stupid.”

“Wow, there’s no need to be so rude.” Sungyeol has stopped laughing, and Myungsoo doesn’t seem to find this situation so amusing anymore.

“It’s not because you got only 30% of compatibility with Sunggyu that you need to act like that.”

Hearing Myungsoo saying the stupid results of the stupid app just makes the anger boils more in Woohyun’s blood. He doesn’t believe in this kind of things, he repeats to himself, it’s just a game, the results are programmed per advance and have nothing to do with reality. It doesn’t mean anything.

Or at least he hopes so. Because knowing that he has only 30% of compatibility with Sunggyu, and that, according to the app, “it’s almost impossible for a long-term relationship to develop between those two, and they will face a lot of difficulties and hardships”, it just makes him want to throw up.

He doesn’t even understand why, because Sunggyu is his best friend, has been for years now, and they never had any big problems between them. He knows that they get along really well, or else how could they have stayed friends for so many years?

Or maybe Sunggyu is just faking all of it, and became his friend only because Woohyun was his neighbor and Sunggyu didn’t know anyone else at that time? And then continued to speak to Woohyun, just because Woohyun was there? Or maybe, all along, it was only Woohyun who wanted to be friend, and spoke to Sunggyu, invited him, and followed him everywhere?

Sungyeol startles Woohyun by putting a hand on his shoulder, distracting him from his thoughts. “Relax hyung, the app is only for romantic bounds between people. And it actually says at the beginning that having a low score just means you have less chances to get married with the person, not that they don’t like you.”

It makes Woohyun feels slightly better. Of course Sunggyu doesn’t fake their friendship, or else Woohyun would have known, after all the times they spent together, and all the hours they spent talking about everything and nothing.

“And it’s not like you have any romantic feelings about Sunggyu hyung, right?”

Woohyun scoffs, and throws Myungsoo his best ‘of course not, what are you even talking about’ look. The idea is stupid, Sunggyu is his best friend, and Woohyun isn’t into men to begin with.

But somehow, the question and also the way Myungsoo looks at him, as if he knew something that even Woohyun doesn’t, bother him a bit. Why would Myungsoo ask something like that in that way? Why would he even have the idea that Woohyun could, eventually, have romantic feelings about Sunggyu?

The air sort of feels heavier suddenly, and there’s something bothering Woohyun in his chest. He inhales deeply, then fakes a laugh. “If I was in love with Sunggyu, I think I would know it, don’t you think?”

 

#####

 

It’s been a month since Woohyun had last seen Sunggyu, and more than two weeks since they last talked to each other through text messages. They are both pretty busy, Sunggyu with his internship in Japan, and Woohyun with the cooking course he decided to follow during summer.

Well, Sunggyu is probably really busy, because he got his internship in a big entertainment company there, and he’s probably constantly running between studios, TV sets, photoshoots, getting a first glance of what his life might be later if he succeeds as a singer. He’s just assisting the manager of a rock band there, but it’s already a first step into the entertainment world. So Woohyun doesn’t dare bothering him with useless messages about how he finally managed to make a soufflé that didn’t fall down after ten seconds, or about the prize he received by the chef himself for being the best student in the class.

But tonight, Woohyun really wants to talk to Sunggyu. He needs to hear his best friend’s voice, because today has been particularly hard and he failed many things for no reason, and only Sunggyu can make him forget about it and feel better.

The first dial tone resonates loudly into Woohyun’s ear. It’s only after four rings that Woohyun hears the click that means Sunggyu accepted the call. There’s some rummaging, a loud sniff, noises of someone clearing their throat, then finally a soft ‘hello’. Even though it’s only a word, Woohyun could tell by the sound of his voice that something is wrong with Sunggyu.

“Sunggyu,” Woohyun swallows hard, “are you crying?” Woohyun closes his eyes after his question, expecting to hear the beep that signal the end of the call. Sunggyu isn’t the kind of person to talk about his feelings at all, and he hates being caught in a moment of ‘weakness’, as he calls it.

Sunggyu sniffs again before answering loudly a strong ‘no’. But his voice breaks at the end of it, and then Woohyun hears another sniff, followed by a soft sob and a weak ‘yes’. Woohyun feels his heart sink deep into his stomach. Because if Kim Sunggyu, the proud Kim Sunggyu that never shed a tear even when he broke his leg in high school, admits that he’s crying, it means that there’s something really wrong.

“Sunggyu, I’m here”. Woohyun doesn’t know what to say. He’s not that good to comfort people to begin with, but comforting Kim Sunggyu is something he never even imagined he would have to do one day.

The silence on the other end of the line continues for a few seconds.

“I wish you really were,” Sunggyu finally says with a broken voice and another sob. The sounds break Woohyun’s heart, but those words, they just filled Woohyun’s body with a new energy, one like he never felt before in his life. He forgets about his own little problems and bad day instantly, because Kim Sunggyu wants him to be next to him, and he just said the words aloud, and Woohyun doesn’t know how to think anymore.

Woohyun chuckles as he pastes the phone even closer to his ear. “I’m on my way hyung, just send me your address. I’m bringing you dinner.” Then, Woohyun hears Sunggyu chuckle too, and he knows his words weren’t just a joke. He has to go there, and finds Sunggyu, and makes him laugh again until he’s okay.

 

#####

 

Somewhere between Seoul and Tokyo, thousands of meters high in the sky, Woohyun suddenly realizes it. He wants Sunggyu to be happy, he wants him to be okay, and to laugh every day. More, he wants to be the one that makes Sunggyu smile and laughs, and he also wants to hear Sunggyu cry and breakdown from time to time and to be here for him when it happens. Just like now.

Woohyun ended his phone call with Sunggyu after forcing the older man to send him his address. Woohyun told him it was to send some cakes he made today in his cooking class. But as soon as he hung up, he grabbed his laptop to buy a plane ticket for Tokyo, not caring about the awfully high price of it. He was just overly excited to have been lucky enough to find a place on the next flight.

With his sudden realization, Woohyun understands Myungsoo’s attitude when he talked to him about Sunggyu. Woohyun’s reactions had nothing to do with quantum entanglement, nor astrology or any game on Sungyeol’s phone. The only reason for his happiness, and sadness, and every other feelings he had and that were related to Kim Sunggyu have just everything to do with him, and Sunggyu. Everything to do with the feelings Woohyun has for Sunggyu, to be more exact. And yes, now he can say it at loud, he is in love with Sunggyu, probably had been for years now, but he was just too stupid to realize until now.

 

#####

 

When the plane landed in Japan, Woohyun was amongst the first passengers to get out of the engine. He just ran all the way out of the airport, only stopping on his way to ask one of the airport’s employee how to go to Sunggyu’s address with his poor Japanese and English knowledge. It was so easy, like in a movie, and Woohyun felt as if he was dreaming. Everything was blurry, from the stewardess bidding him goodbye to the driver of the cab that brought him in front of Sunggyu’s hostel. Everything was going too fast.

It’s only once he’s facing the door of Sunggyu’s room that the time seems to slow down. Woohyun is standing here, at three in the morning, with two cups of ramen he bought on his way in a hand, and a cake he made earlier that day in the other, a bag with only one change of clothes hanging loosely on his side. There’s also doubt. What if Sunggyu isn’t here anymore, what if he was called by the manager of the band and had to go? What if he’s sleeping and doesn’t hear Woohyun knock? What if… what if Woohyun tells him what he realized in the plane and Sunggyu rejects him?

Then again, Woohyun remembers Sunggyu’s broken voice over the phone, and the sobs he heard for the first time even though he had known Sunggyu for years now. And he remembers the way Sunggyu said ‘I wish you were’, and Woohyun doubts anything can go wrong. Because Sunggyu needs him today, and Woohyun did the craziest thing he ever did in his life to be here for him, not to be stopped in front of the door because of stupid thoughts. So he knocks, and bites his lower lip as he waits for an answer, his heart beating like crazy in his chest.

 

#####

Woohyun doesn’t see the door opening, too blinded by stress, until there’s a very sleepy Sunggyu in front of him staring at him with a wide open mouth. Woohyun laughs at his face, and shows Sunggyu the plastic bag with the bowls of ramen.

“Like I said, I brought dinner. And dessert,” he says, showing the cake in his other hand.

Sunggyu looks at Woohyun in silence for a moment, before his eyes focus on the food Woohyun’s holding. Then, they’re back on Woohyun’s face at the same time a smile breaks on Sunggyu’s lips.

“What?” Sunggyu asks softly, watching behind Woohyun as if he’s expected someone to appear and tell him it’s a TV prank. Then he chuckles, and make some room for Woohyun to enter.

Woohyun steps inside the bedroom and puts the food on the small table Sunggyu’s pointing at, before throwing his bag on the floor.

“So, what you’re doing here?” Woohyun’s about to answer again that he brought dinner, but Sunggyu continues before he can start. “I mean, why, no, how did you come?”

“By plane,” Woohyun answered with a smile, amused by the face Sunggyu’s making. “I literally jumped in a plane, like in movies; I bought the ramen on the way here though, so we should eat them before they turn cold and soggy.”

Sunggyu steps closer to Woohyun and to the table where he put the food, but doesn’t make any movement to seat or grab one the bowl. Instead, he’s playing with the hem of his shirt as he stares at the floor, somehow looking embarrassed.

“Thanks.” It’s just a whisper, but Woohyun still caught it as Sunggyu takes one step closer and hugs him like he never did before. Sunggyu doesn’t really like skinship, and they hugged very rarely, only out of joke. But now, Sunggyu’s holding onto him so tightly, his hands clenched on Woohyun’s shirt and face buried on his shoulder, that Woohyun knows immediately he did the right thing by coming here. Woohyun circles his arms around his friend, holding him tight as well to show him that yes, he’s here, and he’s not leaving until Sunggyu is okay.

“I came,” Woohyun starts with a soft voice as he rubs circles on Sunggyu’s back, “because you were crying. And because you said you wanted me here.” Woohyun swallows hard. “I came, because I want to be here when you need me, always.”

Sunggyu chuckles against his shoulder. “You’re stupid.” Woohyun still feels how Sunggyu’s arms tightens around his shoulders despite his words, and it fills him with confidence. The same kind of confidence that made him jump into a plane and travel to another country in the middle of the night.

“No,” Woohyun laughs softly, “I’m just in love with you.”

Sunggyu laughs too, the soft sounds muffled by Woohyun’s shirt as he buries his head even more against his neck. Then, Woohyun feels the soft lips pressing on the side of his throat, then the hot breath hitting against his skin and giving him goosebumps as Sunggyu whispers ‘I know’ before kissing his neck again.


End file.
